Sir Lawrence Peel (10 August 1799 – 1884) was a judge in India,
Chief Justice of Bengal.
Lawrence Peel was third son of Joseph Peel of Bowes Farm, Middlesex, who died in 1821, and Anne, second daughter of Jonathan Haworth of Harcroft, Lancashire. His father was younger brother of the first
Sir Robert Peel (1750–1830), and he was thus first cousin of the statesman, the second
Sir Robert Peel (1788–1850).
He was sent to
Rugby in 1812, and removing to
St John's College, Cambridge
St John's College, formally the College of St John the Evangelist in the University of Cambridge, is a Colleges of the University of Cambridge, constituent college of the University of Cambridge, founded by the House of Tudor, Tudor matriarch L ...
, graduated B.A. 1821 and M.A. 1824.
After his call to the bar at the
Middle Temple
The Honourable Society of the Middle Temple, commonly known simply as Middle Temple, is one of the four Inns of Court entitled to Call to the bar, call their members to the English Bar as barristers, the others being the Inner Temple (with whi ...
on 7 May 1824 he went the northern circuit, and attended the Lancaster, Preston, and Manchester sessions.
He served as
Advocate-General of Bengal at Calcutta from 1840 to 1842, and in the latter year, on being promoted to the chief-justiceship of the
supreme court at Calcutta, was knighted by patent on 18 May. During 1854 and 1855 he was also vice-president of the legislative council at Calcutta. He gave away in public charity the whole of his official income of £8,000 a year. He was consequently very popular throughout his career in India and on his retirement in November 1855 a statue of him was erected in Calcutta.
After his return to England he was sworn of the privy council, and was made a paid member of the judicial committee on 4 April 1856. He was elected a bencher of the Middle Temple on 8 May 1856, and became treasurer of his inn on 3 Dec. 1866. From 1857 he was a director of the East India Company, and in the following year was created a D.C.L. of the university of Oxford. In January 1864 he became president of Guy's Hospital, London. He was for some years a correspondent of the ‘Times’ on legal and general topics. He died, unmarried, at Garden Reach, Ventnor, Isle of Wight, on 22 July 1884.
Works
*''Horæ Nauseæ'', 1841, poems translated and original (the latter are probably juvenile productions)
*''A Sketch of the Life and Character of Sir R. Peel'', 1860.
References
*
;Attribution
{{DEFAULTSORT:Peel, Lawrence
British India judges
1799 births
1884 deaths
People educated at Rugby School
Alumni of St John's College, Cambridge
Members of the Middle Temple
Members of the Privy Council of the United Kingdom
Lawrence